Incompletion of Asset Seizures for Conducting Land Appropriations

When the judgement debtor fails to comply with the whole or part of the court judgment/order pronounced against them, the Civil Procedure Code allows the judgment creditor to apply for execution procedure by filing for a writ of execution with the court. This enables the creditor to get repayment. So, the Legal Execution Department plays a crucial role in dealing with the judgment debtor’s assets during this procedure. However, there are some issues in practice during the legal execution proceeding that we would like to address in this article as follows:

1.Is it necessary to seize any buildings or structures on the land if the land’s value alone covers the debt owed?

In general, when the execution officer operates with the execution proceeding, the execution officer will consider the seizure proceeding under the Civil Procedure Code. This section determines the principle that the property of the judgement debtor shall not be seized or attached in excess of what is sufficient to secure performance to the judgement creditor. In other words, the seizure of property shall not exceed the debt value. However, there is an exception that the seizing property exceeds the debt if the property cannot be separated according to the nature of such property and there is no other judgment debtor’s assets.

In practice, if legal execution involves with seizing land and the land’s value covers the repayment of the debt to the judgment creditor. The execution officer is required to seize the entire property including land, buildings, and all immobility assets attached to it. This is to prevent future disputes over the buildings’ ownership or demolition costs if only the land was initially seized. However, the above-mentioned proceeding is not specified in the law, but it is standard practice to avoid potential future issues that may be occurred during the public auction process.

2. If the Land Seizure is incomplete what is the next step for the judgement creditor?

When the seizure of property is occurring due to the reasons that the judgement debtor fails to comply with the whole or part of the court judgment/order pronounced against them, or the initial seizure of property did not include all buildings or structures on the land, the judgement creditor obliges to take further action. In such cases, the judgement creditor needs to file an entirely new execution petition to seize the remaining assets attached to the land. This new petition will be combined with the original case file. After the new petition is added to the original case file, the relevant execution officer will conduct the full seizure process of assets, including all previously missed assets. When the execution process is completed, the relevant authority will then move forward to the property appraisal process.

Subsequently, the next step involves the property appraisal process, which is regulated by the Regulations of the Ministry of Justice regarding Property Appraisal, B.E. 2557 (2014). This section defines the authority and criteria for conducting the appraisal as follows:

• If the total value of the seized property does not exceed 10 million baht, the official receiver or legal execution officer has the authority to conduct the appraisal of value of property themselves.
• If the property value exceeds 10 million baht but does not exceed 50 million baht, the appraisal of value of property must be carried out by an appraisal officer appointed by the Director-General of the Legal Execution Department.
• If the property value exceeds 50 million baht, the appraisal of value of property must be conducted by the appraisal committee appointed by the Director-General of the Legal Execution Department.

3. The next steps once the property is apprised?

Once the relevant authority has conducted the appraisal of value of all properties and determined the value, the seizure property will be entered into the public auction under the Civil Procedure Code.

Author: Panisa Suwanmatajarn, Managing Partner.

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